Hugh Mackenzie
Huntsville Doppler
It’s too early to write off Ford
I was surprised by a comment made yesterday by former NDP Premier Bob Rae. He was also interim leader of the Federal Liberals and likely would have become their official leader and perhaps even Prime Minister of Canada were it not for some vicious and bloody backroom politics inside the Liberal camp in days gone by.
I have always liked Bob Rae and consider him a friend. He is loyal to his political views, which are often very different than mine, but he has always shown respect for the business of politics and for those who participate in it, regardless of their partisan positions. In more recent years, he has in many ways risen above politics and become a fierce and effective defender of human rights and is regarded by many, including me, as a statesman.
But yesterday he was not very statesmanlike when he quipped, “If someone can revoke two appointments the next day, cannot someone revoke a vote a year after?” He was referring of course to the political woes of Premier Doug Ford and posturing that it would be nice if we could simply revoke the election results of a year ago that gave Doug Ford a strong majority government. I was surprised by this comment because Bob Rae knows better.
He has no reason to like or support Doug Ford. But he has every reason to know how hard it is for a new Premier to govern during their first year in office. After all he has been there and done that. The challenges and problems of course were different, but Bob Rae had a terrible time during his early years as Premier. Even his own Party turned against him. I was there and I saw it.
The one thing and probably the only thing that Bob Rae and Doug Ford have in common is that they both inherited, when assuming office, a huge economic problem. In Rae’s case it was a recession. In Ford’s case, it was an overwhelming public debt that will be devastating to Ontario’s future if it is not seriously reined in.
I am not a charter member of Ford Nation. In fact. I voted for Christine Elliott during the Ontario Conservative leadership race. But Doug Ford and his government were elected with a strong mandate to deal with Ontario’s economic mess; to reduce the size of government and to cut costs. I support that.
What I do not support and what obviously, if you believe the polls, what many other people do not support is the knee-jerk and arbitrary way the Ford Government has gone about doing what they were elected to do, without any apparent, comprehensive plan. Along the way they have made some serious mistakes and of course when it comes to cuts, many of those who support the need for them in theory quickly have a different view when it happens in their own back yard.
And so it was time for a reset; the right thing for a Premier to do after a year in government and to the horror of much of the media, who want to see this government fail, it just might work.
Rob Phillips will be a much more effective Finance Minister than was Vic Fedeli, who got the top job in the Ford Government primarily for his role in sabotaging former party leader Patrick Brown. Phillips is much more qualified. For starters he has an MBA and is a graduate of the Rotman School of Management. He has vast business experience including stints as the Chair of Post Media and President and CEO of the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation. He is highly regarded and respected in the financial community. Frankly, he should have had the job in the first place.
Rob Phillips is strategic. He will discourage knee-jerk reactions. He will do what needs to be done to cut the size and cost of government to an affordable level, but he will do it in a well-planned and consultative manner. That is all we can ask for.
Other Ministers who were moved in the Ford shuffle were moved for the right reasons; some because their talents were needed elsewhere, others because they were not effective where they were. It is a leader’s job to know when that has to happen.
It is also the leader’s job to know when things are not going well in his own office. This is always the toughest job because leaders tend to surround themselves with people they know and trust and whose loyalty is unquestioned. But Dean French had to go. In simple terms, Dean French, as Ford’s Chief of Staff, had alienated the Conservative Caucus, the very opposite of what he was supposed to do. In them, he fostered a culture of fear rather than a culture of loyalty. That can be deadly to any Premier.
What Premier Ford desperately needs is a Chief of Staff who knows how to treat caucus and cabinet members with respect, not as trained monkeys. He may have that already with the Acting Chief of Staff Jamie Wallace, who has extensive Party and Government experience and is known for his even and respectful temperament and his strategic mind.
I think of Hugh Segal, who was Chief of Staff to Brian Mulroney during a tough time in his mandate as Prime Minister of Canada. He made sure that Mulroney’s caucus would take a bullet for him if need be. Segal treated caucus as the government’s most important asset. He made sure they were highly respected, that they were fed, watered and cared for. By doing so, when times were tough caucus was there for the Prime Minister. Doug Ford does not need a Chief of Staff who intimidates caucus. He needs a Chief of Staff like Hugh Segal.
Significant changes have been made in Doug Ford’s government. Time will tell if they will make a meaningful difference in his popularity or his effectiveness. But in spite of the eagerness of some to do so, it is much too early to write him off.
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Wake up, Hugh, a re-start, in light of the evidence may indicate a loss in your objectivity.
Have a look at Star article by Bob Hepburn, “Premier Ford’s year of living stupidly”, June 27, 2019. His opinion piece sums up just some of my issues with him, his government, and his party! The list goes on…..
I anticipated he would be at least as bad as Harris, DF and his government has outdone this predecessor. The latest move for the “gravy train” increases to the 6-figure salaries of $16K for 31 MPPs (CBC news) belies that our Ontario fiscal problems are in such dire deficits! Really?????
This is enough for this posting, I value my adrenal gland.
Firing nepotistic staff, which is what Mr. Ford had to do, is not a political reset. It’s a Herculean stable clean.
Hiring a guy with a checkered financial past and an MBA from a provincial business school is not a political solution to an economic imbalance it is a reward for services rendered.
There is nothing that “may work” as nothing has been done in this “reset” except send home the goon who assassinated Mr. Brown and retire that flannel-mouthed carpetbagger from the US who countermanded her own Judges over their decision against the slash and burn of the City of Toronto’s already delicate governance.
Red or soft Tories who think that they see a glimmer of a hope for some serious governance for this province from a man who, according to his own family’s law suit against him nearly bankrupted a profitable Stateside label business, are drinking too much of the summer cool aid.
Mr. Ford, now joined by Mr. Kenney, formally of Oakville and once a singularly unsuccessful Immigration Minister have set themselves up to prop up Mr. Scheer in his attempts to dismantle the work done by Mr. Trudeau and his Liberals.
That task should have been rather simple since Mr. Trudeau has largely failed to walk the walk and his most recent humiliating request to Mr. Trump to pull his chestnuts out of the fire with China should have spelled -30- to that school boy romp.
Sadly all Mr. Ford has done with his mismanagement of multiple provincial files is paint himself as an inept bully bludgeoning Mr. Scheer into some sort of squeaky protest which may very well keep the Liberals in power in October albeit in a minority government.
Mr. Ford needs to disappear, perhaps not by a ballot revocation as Bob Rae ironically suggested, but disappear off the political scene until after the October election. That is the only reset needed. He has declared a five- month holiday for him and his rag-tag cabinet over at the pink palace. Hopefully he will use the time to do absolutely nothing. It really is where his talents lie.
Good article Hugh. Very informative and interesting with your inside knowledge and experience. Both FORD and Trump are doing a lot of things right, unfortunately it’s the way they go about it. I think Ford could be very good, if your predictions are right.
Wit respect, Hugh, I believe that you misrepresented the reasons for Dean French’s dismissal/resignation. I find it extremely difficult to believe that Premier Ford, alleged to be somewhat of a bully in his own right, would have a problem with Mr. French engendering a ‘culture of fear’ in his caucus. The two conflicts of interest, however, were egregious and unsupportable. Tyler Albrecht, agent-general in NYC at a salary of $165K, is a lacrosse buddy of French’s son. Taylor Shields, agent-general in London at a salary of $185K, is related to French’s wife. I still consider Bob Rae to be a statesman, who shoots from the hip.
I agree with you on this Hugh. The premier is in an unenviable position with an almost insurmountable task of trying to correct the fiscal mess created by the previous government. Even the smallest tweaks, poorly executed as they have been, have solicited howls of outrage…imagine if they truly did what was necessary.
I suppose that’s the problem with government, once you give people something, regardless of whether it’s economically prudent, taking it away is seemingly impossible.